“You’d soon wish you were a bird again,” retorted Magnanimity. “Are you aware that men can’t fly, or lay eggs, or talk our language, or do anything really worth doing? Are you aware that we old birds lead them the very devil of a life?” “How do you do it?” asked the mere chick, quite unable to keep the wonder and admiration out of the tone of its voice. “Why, we mock at ’em--sneer at ’em till they can’t bear themselves.” Marjorie and Maurice walked on, talking of indifferent things. They climbed the hill, resting occasionally in the shade of the plantations that grew on its sides. They reached the summit at last, a solitary place where the ruined chapel of St. Margaret stood in a little deserted grave-yard. The wind was fresh and cool. They could see far away into the distance; they could see the river winding along down the valley, until it was a mere thread of silver; they could see the smoke curling up from low, red-roofed cottages and farm-buildings, scattered here and there. Maurice stretched himself at full length on the grass, and endeavoured to light a cigarette. There was just enough wind to blow a match out. There always is. “Now then, Marjorie, you had a dream last night.” “Yes!” “And it frightened you.” “No--no--well, it didn’t exactly frighten me--it made me think. It was all nonsense, you know, and yet it was the realest dream I ever had in my life.” “Stop a minute. You had some coffee in the drawing-room, and that kept you awake for a long time, you turned about from side to side, and thought about the beetle. Your bedroom seemed hot and stifling.” “Yes, that’s all true--how did you know, Maurice?--but it has not got anything to do with it.” “Marjorie, if you’d never had that coffee, you’d have never had that dream. Now, then, let’s hear it. I’ll try to keep awake, but walking always makes me sleepy.” “After I had said good-night to everybody, I went up into the schoolroom and got the beetle, because I was afraid the servants might throw it away in the morning, and you said you wanted it. I took it into my own room, and put it down on a table. All the while I was undressing, I kept thinking about it and wondering if beetles and other things could really understand, or if it were only men and women who knew about things, and if all the world were just made for us alone. Before I got into bed I picked the beetle up, and said to it, ‘Beetle, you’ve got to come into my dream to-night, and tell me all about it. Don’t forget.’ Of course that was just a fancy. I didn’t really think it could understand what I said, or that it would come. I’m not a baby, though Aunt Julia treats me like one sometimes. Well, for a long time I couldn’t get to sleep, but at last I did.” “And then the beetle came and suffocated you, or threw you over a precipice,” remarked Maurice, drowsily.